Grounders is a heartfelt personal documentary about a women’s softball league in Brooklyn, New York: the games, the teams, and the players that take the field. Exploring the dynamic personalities and compelling life stories of a diverse group of women, Grounders captures an inside view of a unique sub-culture, and a thoughtful and uplifting revelation of their community emerges. With Brooklyn as the backdrop, and connections that blur the boundaries of race, class, age, religion, and sexual orientation, these women have many stories to tell about why they are there.
Two artists from Alexandria, Virginia, revisit the town’s segregated past and tell the story of family, friendship, loss, and love through historical dollhouses.
Maurice Hines -- actor, director, singer, and choreographer -- navigates the complications of show business while grieving the loss of his more famous, often estranged younger brother, tap dance legend Gregory Hines.
The story of Jack Johnson, the first African American Heavyweight boxing champion.
Traces the life of Booker T. Washington, ex-slave, author, educator, and political leader, focusing on his stewardship of Tuskegee Institute in Alabama. Uses historic photographs, re-created vignettes, and interviews with contemporaries such as W.E.B. DuBois to present Washington's complex personality and his influence on southern life after the Civil War. Also examines his controversial policies of Black economic self-reliance and political accommodation
A short film entitled "A Letter To Claudette Colvin", written and directed by Victoria Wilson bringing awareness to Colvin's involvement in the Montgomery Bus Boycott which ignited due to her refusal on March 2, 1955.
In the wilderness of the Bucharest Delta, nine children and their parents lived in perfect harmony with nature for 20 years – until they are chased out and forced to adapt to life in the big city.
Since the end of World War II, one of kind of urban residential development has dominate how cities in North America have grown, the suburbs. In these artificial neighborhoods, there is a sense of careless sprawl in an car dominated culture that ineffectually tries to create the more organically grown older communities. Interspersed with the comments of various experts about the nature of suburbia
Denver’s iconic and Grammy Award-winning musicians reveal the secrets of their success and longevity in the music business while warning the young lions to whom they pass the torch to stay relevant in a marketplace both treacherous and brutal. The majestic Rocky Mountains tower over a bustling metropolis filled with steamy and romantic nightclubs where jazz flourishes on stage. JazzTown features never seen before live concert footage on historic stages that have now crumbled due to economic stresses of the Covid Pandemic. ~ Dianne Reeves, 5-time Grammy Award winner for Best Jazz Vocalist ~ US Senator John Hickenlooper (former jazz club owner) ~ Ron Miles (Colorado Music Hall of Fame, Joshua Redman, Bill Frisell, Ginger Baker) ~ Charlie Hunter (Snarky Puppy, Christian McBride, Stanton Moore) ~ Art Lande (Mark Isham, Gary Peacock) ~ Ayo Awosika (Session Singer on Soundtracks to: Wakanda Forever, Nope, Dune, The Lion King ... tours with Miley Cyrus,) and many more.
A collection of personal anecdotes from those who have navigated through a tumultuous year in America.
He ran the most infamous drug empire in Brooklyn. They unleashed a violent reign of destruction on the streets of New York that made George H. Bush campaign for the War On Drugs. He orchestrated robberies, kidnappings, murdered in cold blood, and beat the charges. This true crime documentary examines how Brian Glaze Gibbs saved his life and found redemption.
This documentary is a portrait of Point St. Charles, one of Montreal’s notoriously bleak neighbourhoods. Many of the residents are English-speaking and of Irish origin; many of them are also on welfare. Considered to be one of the toughest districts in all of Canada, Point St. Charles is poor in terms of community facilities, but still full of rich contrasts and high spirits – that is, most of the time.
Lacey Schwartz grew up in a typical upper-middle-class Jewish household in Woodstock, NY, with loving parents and a strong sense of her Jewish identity - despite the open questions from those around her about how a white girl could have such dark skin. She believes her family's explanation that her looks were inherited from her dark-skinned Sicilian grandfather. But when her parents abruptly split, her gut starts to tell her something different. At age of 18, she finally confronts her mother and learns the truth: her biological father was not the man who raised her, but a black man named Rodney with whom her mother had had an affair.
Documentary film on events that happened on August 28th in African-American history, shown at the Smithsonian African-American History Museum.
Set in the Hasidic enclave of Borough Park, Brooklyn, "93Queen" follows a group of tenacious Hasidic women who are smashing the patriarchy in their community by creating the first all-female volunteer ambulance corps in New York City. With unprecedented-and insider-access, "93Queen" offers up a unique portrayal of a group of religious women who are taking matters into their own hands to change their own community from within.
Winner of the DOC NYC Audience Award, Director Nick Canfield’s first film follows gospel-rock icon and activist Reverend Vince Anderson. After entering seminary, Vince dropped out to follow his second calling - music. With his band The Love Choir, he has played a now-legendary weekly show for over twenty years. Reconnecting with his faith and using his intense soulful music, he began to preach a type of spirituality that is open to all, meets people where they are, and moves everyone that sees him play. Reverend Vince is also deeply involved in social justice, working with other faith leaders around the country to build inclusive communities. Featuring Questlove and an ensemble of eccentric musicians, The Reverend is a rocking concert film as well as an intimate portrait of Reverend Vince’s inspiring personal and spiritual life.
Today it's a symbol of strength and vitality. 135 years ago, it was a source of controversy. This documentary examines the great problems and ingenious solutions that marked the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge. From conception to construction, it traces the bridge's transformation from a spectacular feat of heroic engineering to an honored symbol in American culture.
From the Boogie Down Bronx and beyond, the history of the b-boy.
This short documentary follows three Indigenous women as they practice ancestral forms of worship: drumming, singing, and using sweetgrass. These ancient spiritual traditions may at first seem at odds with urban life, but to Indigenous people in Canada who are used to praying in natural settings, the whole world is sacred space.
A rare close-up of the Abakuá —an Afro-Cuban religious brotherhood that has been hidden from outsiders until recently. A symbol of resistance for over 200 years, the Abakuá society has managed to survive slavery, the Spanish domination and the Revolution, spite of all the bias and misunderstandings about their traditions and rituals.